‘Knowing what it means to be Irish’: experience as practice in the advertising industry

This article derives from sociological research examining practitioners in the Irish advertising industry. Drawing from interviews with workers in this field, I examine how Irish advertising practitioners have co-opted the ‘idiom of identity’, enabling them to speak with greater confidence and in more emotionally compelling ways about advertising audiences, to humanize business strategy and to operationalize personal biographical experience in production. This article focuses on the ways Irish advertising practitioners describe their work and their understandings of Irishness in the context of a globalized Ireland and draws attention to what I describe as a ‘discursive affinity’ between cultural identity and professional acumen in the accounts of these workers. In concentrating on their valorizing of innate ‘knowing’, and drawing especially on the work of Foucault, this article attempts to explain why Irish advertising practitioners regard their own life experience as practice.     

The absence of ‘race’ in German discourses on Bildung. Rethinking Bildung with critical race theory

This paper investigates the impact of mostly implicit convictions about ‘white supremacy’ and racist ideas in traditional and recent theories of Bildung which is a central educational concept in Germany. Concepts of Bildung describe processes of individual self-formation. It will be argued that the notion of Bildung is still very important in academic and public discourses on education in general and on educational inequities in particular. It will be argued that the concept of Bildung focuses on a certain understanding of the subject which does not take into account structural inequities in terms of diversity, even though it is omnipresent in discourses on education and diversity in Germany. To show how deeply ingrained in philosophical and political ideas a racialised concept of Bildung is, selected works of Kant, Hegel and Wilhelm von Humboldt on education on the one hand, and on ‘race’ on the other will be analysed by using Critical Race Theory. However, despite this critique concerning the inherent ‘white’ supremacy, the critical potential of Bildung is worth recognising by formulating a critical race perspective on Bildung.     

‘I was forced here’: perceptions of agency in second generation ‘return’ migration to Tonga

Migrants’ adolescent children sometimes live for periods of time in their parents’ homeland; however, little attention has been paid to this in the literature on ‘return’ migration and transnationalism. This paper explores the experiences of overseas born Tongan youth spending time in high schools in Tonga, whether by choice or because they have been taken or sent due to concerns about their behaviour. The importance of these young people’s perceptions of agency in relation to their move is considered as a factor in their responses to their experiences in Tonga. Other factors shaping those experiences include their family situation, the school they attend and the wider attitudes in Tongan society towards these young people. The paper also considers the question of agency in relation to the cultural expectations these overseas born youth must learn to meet, which entail significant restrictions on their behaviour yet are also a means of strengthening their cultural identity and sense of belonging.     

Obamacare in action: how access to the health care system contributes to immigrants’ sense of belonging

ABSTRACT

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) aimed to reduce stark health inequalities by providing universal health insurance to all Americans and long-term authorised immigrants. Later regulations, however, gave the 50 U.S. states latitude to choose the degree of coverage for their constituencies. In this paper, we explore how interactions with these diverse systems of care contribute to the incorporation of immigrants into America, especially among the most likely to remain uninsured: the working poor. We uncovered a process in which immigrants’ access to health coverage and care was informed by the procedural justice embedded in their interactions with representatives of the health care system. These interactions signalled to immigrants their deservingness in American society, operating as a system of incorporation in the most inclusive states and as a barrier to incorporation in the most exclusive ones. Repealing the ACA may exacerbate differences across states in access to health care among eligible immigrants and end the incipient transformation of the U.S. health care system into an agent of immigrant incorporation.     

From ‘Russianness’ to ‘Israeliness’ through the landscape of the soul: therapeutic discourse in the practice of immigrant absorption in Israel with ‘Russian’ adolescents

This article explores the increasing incorporation of professional therapeutic knowledge and practices into the state-led apparatus of absorption of new immigrants in Israel. Singling out this phenomenon is the seemingly unexpected alliance between the therapeutic ethos, which leans on individualist, a-national and universal values, and state-led absorption practices, based on a Zionist, collectivist and local ethos. According to the Zionist ethos, the newcomer ‘returning to an historical homeland’ is expected to become part of a territorially bounded collective entity and to adopt a new national identity that will predominate over other identities. The therapeutic ethos undermines moral authorities promoting collective redemption through identification with community goals and challenges a patronizing attitude towards new immigrants. Analysing the rhetoric and practice of Na'aleh – a decade-and-a-half-old project for adolescents immigrating from the former Soviet Union, characterized by a ‘therapeutic absorption policy’, this article examines the meaning of ‘therapeutic’ absorption in shaping a new Israeli citizen within the current social context. In order to clarify the historical uniqueness of this phenomenon, Na'aleh's absorption paradigm is compared to Youth Aliyah – the project that absorbed youngsters in a distinctly different ideological period of Israeli history (early 1940s), particularly with regard to the status of Zionism. A locus of comparison is the perceptions of the absorbing personnel and the absorbed immigrants in both ventures. The main claim of this article is that the psychologizing of the absorption apparatus both challenges and fortifies the traditional role of statist Zionism under global, postmodern conditions, typified by the erosion of the nation-state and questioning the moral status of its constitutive ethos. Therapeutic absorption transforms the newcomer into the object of therapeutic intervention rather than assimilative education. However, it simultaneously enables the ‘Russian’ teenagers from a ‘pre-therapeutic society’ to internalize a ‘therapeutic habitus’, which grants them the skills and competency to become a ‘local’ and to attain symbolic goods significant in their new social environment. Therapeutic personnel, characterized by emotional skills and cultural proximity to the absorbed pupils, rather than ideological identification with Zionist project, serve as a newer version of traditional agents of Israeli socialization, by virtue of their own unique course of absorption in Israel that blends the process of ‘becoming Israeli’ with socialization into a professional/therapeutic culture.     

Gypsy students in the UK: the impact of ‘mobility’ on education

This paper argues that Gypsy students in primary and secondary education in the UK are marginalised because of ambiguous understandings of their ‘mobility’. Drawing on research conducted on the south coast of England, it examines Gypsy families’ experiences of education. Despite often describing their identity in relation to travelling or mobility, few families’ lifestyles were characterised by actual movement or nomadism. Teachers and educationalists meanwhile cite the need to deliver a ‘mobile’ rather than a ‘sedentary’ education for Gypsy students. The Department for Communities and Local Government recently defined Gypsy ethnicity in direct relation to a nomadic lifestyle. This is problematic as the association between Gypsy ethnicity and nomadism is itself questionable and may be better understood in more nuanced terms reflecting the relationship between identity and ‘mobility’. This paper argues that ‘mobility’ is understood to define Gypsy difference in a way that excludes students.     

Genealogy as Theory,Genealogy as Tool: Aspects of Somali ‘Clanship’

Genealogy is both a tool for organizing people on the day to day political level, and an intellectual scheme for understanding human history. This article looks at the conception of genealogy that the Somalis have inherited from their past and examines the ways in which it has been rejected, manipulated and theorized in recent times, especially since the civil war.     

Melbourne's Islamic Museum of Australia: The “White-Washed ‘I’” as an Apollonian Celebration of Liberal Myths

Abstract

This paper examines how the Melbourne's Islamic Museum of Australia tells a story of an “Australian Islam” through its use of material and artistic objects; how it symbolizes and synthesizes the assumed binary of East and West, through spatial expressions that narrate a religious community's “growing up” in a changing urban and Australian context. Furthermore, it looks at how the curators, intentionally or otherwise, deal politically with the Muslim community's affective relationships that are shaped by their experiences as a minority that endures a persistent Islamophobia in the community. By examining the role the Museum's material artefacts play in intercultural relations within a multicultural Australia the paper draws from Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, to argue that the Museum reflects an Apollonian sense of art that attempts to regulate and control the wilder excesses of a Dionysian and communal spirit. The Apollonian view translates to an expressive and abstract celebration of liberal myths about progress and individuality that purposely relegates the more dangerous struggles of Muslim immigrants dealing with the conditions of a Dionysian post-colony to the shadows.     

The ‘immunized integration’ of Religious-Zionists within Israeli society: the pre-military academy as an institutional model

The article examines the process of establishment of pre-military academies amongst Religious-Zionist society in Israel. The phenomenon is discussed as a transition from a model of a gated community to an ‘immunized’ community. Through institutionalization of psycho-social ideological preparation, the community leadership is trying to ensure that community members maintain their identity and loyalty when they integrate into general society. The article rests on analysis of the discourse of the community’s epistemic leadership – mainly rabbis and leaders of the settler movement. It contributes to the perception of the pre-military academies as institutions that are Religious-Zionist launching pads for senior positions in the IDF and pipelines for future leadership of Israeli society. At the same time, they are a means of ensuring that Religious-Zionists will integrate within Israel society, not through assimilation and dissolution, but rather with cultural and ideological commitment to their community of origin. The article also discusses the development of other similar ‘immunizing’ institutions that aim to facilitate integration of Religious-Zionists in spheres other than the military. These developments are presented as an attempt on the part of the community leadership to maintain its status and relevance, in view of the younger generation’s desire to break out of the gated community boundaries. Thus, these institutions might be viewed as more of a rearguard battle on the part of the leadership than as a behavior-guiding ethos among the younger generation.     

‘King's inheritors': understanding the ethnic discourse on the Rajbanshi as an indigenous community

The rise of ethnic struggles in various parts of the world, particularly in the post-colonial period, is an intriguing phenomenon. Having the consciousness of primordial origins, indigenous communities have pursued ethnic mobilizations along different lines in order to achieve the goals of social and economic uplift. This paper focuses on the Rajbanshi, one such community living in northeast India, as they offer an opportunity to study history and ethnic identity formation as the dynamics behind their current situation. From the standpoint of applied anthropology, processes of social change and activism intended to improve the lot of Rajbanshi communities are evaluated. Given their obscure origins, cultural diversity and divided political struggle, the Rajbanshi are far from achieving their goal of pursuing better lives. Strategies of Sanskritization and ‘sons-of-the-soil’ indigeneity have not reaped the desired results in terms of social and economic development. Furthermore, discourses rooted in immigrant-aboriginal binaries and theoretical dichotomies of primordialism–constructivism fail to make sense of this community's experience and are not helpful in guiding them toward meaningful and fruitful political and social change.     

Learning through laughing: an ‘African-American’ singer with ‘Japanese soul’ and the possibility of a new subjectivity in Japan

In this article, we argue that laughter can be a catalyst in learning about a new subjectivity – simultaneously African-American and Japanese – by analyzing an audience’s initial reaction to Jero, a young ‘African-American’ singer wearing hip hop attire who sings enka, a genre of music that is considered the ‘heart and soul of Japan’. Using television clips uploaded to YouTube and the viewers’ comments left on the sites as data, we analyze the audience’s laughter and amazement, followed by the question, ‘Why?’ and explanation of his background. Drawing on Hervé Varenne’s argument that learning occurs when we acknowledge our ignorance and seek to change it, we argue that the laughter marks their ignorance of such subjectivity, followed by learning as to why such subjectivity is possible. Challenging hegemonic behavior in daily life is often considered ‘bad sport’ and thus difficult. While involving complex relations of power of consumer-performer relations and authenticator-authenticated relations as well as a problematic race-talent link, we suggest that learning-through-laughing may be a new field worth exploring as an effective strategy for social change.     

‘From badness to sickness’:1 the role of ethnopsychology in shaping ethnic hierarchies in Israel

This article explores the role of the psychological sciences in depoliticising processes of ethnic demarcation and marginalisation within the Jewish population in Israel. It shows how the psychological sciences have provided the scientific foundation by which cultural domination and subordination have been essentialised. The study traces the ways in which ethnopsychological discourse has changed its contours over time. Early ethnopsychological discourse provided an overt link between the ‘cultural backwardness’ and ‘psychological impairment’ of the Mizrahi Jew. In light of broad social and political transformations, in the more recent model the overt ethnic signifier was silenced, and the Mizrahi ‘impaired mind’ appeared to be detached from its ethnic roots while being attributed to the same ethnic population. Both ethnopsychological forms have focused on the individual's ‘special needs’ and ‘inherent psychological impairment’, obscuring the role of social and political forces in shaping social gaps in Israeli society and reinforcing the hegemonic discourse of nurture. The latter has provided a negative mirror image of the modern Ashkenazi secular Israeli Jew following Western cultural models of self‐control as the universal index of health and progress. This study is based on both primary and secondary sources as well as on my in situ observations.     

The ‘illegal’ and the skilled: effects of media portrayals on perceptions of immigrants in Britain

Public perceptions often diverge widely from reality on the size and make-up of immigrant populations, with likely consequences for public opinion about immigration. Prior research has not established whether the media has any causal role in the construction of these perceptions. This paper examines whether and how actually occurring media portrayals of immigrants in Britain affect perceptions of immigrants among members of the British public. We begin by conducting a large-scale quantitative study of the British national press. We then report on an original survey experiment that tests for causal impact of news frames derived from the media study. Specifically, we focus on three depictions of immigrants: as ‘illegal’, Eastern European, or highly skilled. Results show that even subtle media interventions can shift public perceptions of immigration, in this case towards more realistic understandings of the overall size and make-up of the immigrant population in Britain. We suggest empirical, theoretical, and methodological implications for the study of media effects on public opinion towards immigration.     

Multilingualism and identity: articulating ‘African-ness’ in an American high school

This paper draws on qualitative research that examines the language practices and learning experiences of ten adolescent multilingual immigrant and refugee English Learners (ELs) from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Specific questions addressed include: How do these students capitalize on home languages as they engage in linguistic practices in English? How do these students take up their identities within the context of a US high school? The project emphasizes a shift away from learning discrete language skills in one language toward a focus on supporting complex language and content learning fluidly across languages and content areas in ways that affirm students’ identities and new learning. Implications for theory and practice will be discussed.     

‘They were constantly on the losing side of things’: the pedagogical power of an African-American teacher candidate bearing witness in teacher education

The stories of students and teacher candidates of Color (Just as singular racial/ethnic identities are capitalized (i.e. African-American, Asian, Latina, Native American etc.), I capitalize Color to honor the various identities that many ‘non-white’ people hold near and dear. I recognize the nuances in doing so- such as the reality that the term ‘people of Color’ actually erases identity while the term also highlights a shared experience (though also nuanced) of being ‘non-white’ in a white supremacist society.) hold powerful lessons and insights for teacher education programs and educational reform efforts. Yet, rarely do educators and policy-makers solicit or critically engage the educational narratives of these stakeholders. In particular, research confirms that we know little about how students’ of Color educational experiences are impacted by race(ism) and culture and how those experiences subsequently inform their ideas about teaching. This study, framed by critical race theory (CRT), examines an African-American (African-American is used intentionally here as this is how Ariel identifies racially.) teacher candidate’s racialized K-12 and postsecondary school experiences to more fully understand the connection between lived experience and developing teacher identity. Ariel’s story reflects her own school experiences; her focus on her peers’ school experiences when asked about her own; and how those experiences, informed by race and culture, contribute to her development of pedagogy. Analytical considerations illustrate that memory and remembrance, witnessing and bearing witness, and testimony are deliberate and powerful acts in the development of pedagogy and should be central to teacher education curriculum.     

‘If I’m going to teach about the world,I need to know the world’: developing Australian pre-service teachers’ intercultural competence through international trips

Increasingly, there is an imperative to prepare teachers who can address the needs of ethnically and racially diverse learners. One way to do so is to make available to pre-service teachers opportunities for an international experience so that they might learn about the world and develop better understandings of cultural diversity and difference. In this article, I draw on the findings of a qualitative study that aimed to investigate pre-service teachers’ perceptions of the value of an international experience to their development as teachers. I present excerpts of interview data that highlight how fourteen Australian pre-service teachers who went to India to live and teach for a month, made sense of their experiences. Findings raise concerns about how they saw the trip primarily as an opportunity for tourism and how it became a vehicle through which postcolonial and neocolonial views were developed and maintained. I conclude by making recommendations for teacher education as well as for the organisation of the trip.     

Defining ‘real India’: representations of authenticity in independent travel

As an alternative to the stereotypical mass tourism, independent travellers – travellers who travel for extended periods on low budgets while ostensibly avoiding formalized tourist activities and locales – are invested in constructing ‘authentic’ travel experiences. Practices such as ‘off-the-beaten-track’ travel and cultural engagement provide the means by which independent travellers are able to make claims to such authenticity. Authenticity is constructed by travellers through idealizations of intimacy and non-commodification. These idealizations are tangled in narrative representations of ‘real’ India and ‘real’ Indians, their ‘real’-ness typified by an absence of other travellers, tourists and, more generally, Western contamination. In these ways, ‘authentic’ travel is dependent upon actively constructed binaries of Western travelling subjects and exotic Indian objects. Yet travellers' fantasies of the Other are fragile and subject to collapse at moments in which so-called Others articulate their subjectivity in a way that is inconsistent with travellers' expectations. Through a focus on travellers' narratives of their experience, both the requirement for an Orientalist dichotomy as well as the ruptures that continually challenge this dichotomy, will emerge.     

Land of welcome,land of fear: explaining approaches to ‘new’ diversity in Catalonia and South Tyrol

This article contributes to recent work on the interplay between sub-state nationalism and migrant integration, showing the different government approaches toward migration developed in Catalonia and South Tyrol and exploring factors behind this divergence. In particular, the articles emphasised three main interplaying variables: (1) previous historical experience with internal migration; (2) how this experience shaped the process of national identity construction; (3) and the institutional context, that is, arrangements in place to regulate and manage ‘old’ diversity. In this way, the article lays bare additional contingent processes that advance accounts of the relationships between ‘old’ national minorities and ‘new’ migrant communities.     

Racism as a threshold concept: examining learning in a ‘diversity requirement’ course

This article frames racism as a threshold concept and, using qualitative data from written coursework, examines student learning of that concept in a racially diverse college course. The data suggest scaffolding learning and using real-world applications correlate to student mastery of the threshold concept of racism. Findings also suggest that students of color, those who assessed their understandings of issues of race and racism on the first day of class as mixed (rather than expert or weak), those who took the course primarily due to interest, and upperclassmen moved more quickly toward advanced understandings of racism. Qualitative data illustrate that the ways in which the threshold concept was troublesome and transformative varies for students, particularly by race. This study answers the call for more research on the pedagogy of racism as related to the learning experiences of students of color, especially in diverse classrooms.     

Indian identities in the ‘rainbow nation’: Responses to transformation in South African schools

Ethnic minorities pose important challenges for nation-building in post-apartheid South Africa. Indian/black African accommodation is examined through the microcosm of former Indian secondary schools in Pietermaritzburg. The development of Indian identities since the beginnings of indenture in the 1860s reflects an accommodation along predominantly ethnic rather than class-based lines. Whereas the shared educational experience of Indians under apartheid has served to reinforce ascribed ‘Indian’ identity, internal divisions are reflected in fragmented Indian voting behaviour since 1994. Fieldwork on patterns of desegregation in five former Indian secondary schools reveals critical differences between staff and governing bodies committed to transformation and more narrowly focused concerns of often conservative or apolitical parents. These differences are consistent with historic socio-political divisions among Indian South Africans. Transformation of former Indian schools embraces challenges, which, if successfully negotiated, could help to enable Indians to forge an identity of their own making in post-apartheid South Africa.